Chapter IV - Picturesque views

Araxá - Rio de Janeiro - Curitiba - Ilha do Mel - Curitiba - Foz do Iguaçu

Up first, pictures from Araxá:

Meeting some of Sanni's friends after six long years!
Andim, Fred, Wilker, Poliana, Arison (and later
Hugo and Rogerio too), foi bom ver vcs!

Visiting Barreiro with Sanni's brazilian mum Eliene,
who let us stay in her home for the week.

SWEET PIZZA and salami, thanks Diego!

Oops, rebellionism. Two piercings in different
ears weren't the best idea, after more than a
week they still hurt when laying in bed :<

We went to see small waterfalls near Araxá.

Behind you can see some of the falls. In front
Anneli almost falling off of a cliff. On the same
trip we got a proof that brazilians drive reclessly
 - though the car didn't break, the front tire
wasn't as lucky.

Everyone we told about us being homesick and in some way wanting to go back home just said, wait and see how you will feel in a couple of weeks. We were waiting forward to the feeling of excitement and wanted to really start our trip. Thankfully we guessed correctly and Araxá was the thing to pull us out of our culture shock. After a week of relaxing and doing fun stuff with Sanni's friends, we headed to Rio. Sanni had been there 3 times before, so she wasn't as excited as I was. The song Copacabana had been stuck in my head for days before going there (and was the whole time we spent in Rio). We arrived in Rio early in the morning and had to find out something to do for the hours before check in. We of course went to the beach and ended up falling asleep and burning ourselves partially. Sanni now has a (hopefully) permanent hippo'ish' looking creature on her right thigh and very brown feet.

Everybody wants to go by bus!

Sanni's now probably permanent hippo friend, who was
at some point infested by a rash and sun allergy. (Note to
Sanni's mum, she put Bepathen on it many times a day.)

There is so much to see in Rio that we were wondering how we could see it all the easiest and cheapest way. Originally we didn't want to do the 'tourist thing' and do an expensive tour where you go see everything with a guide. But in the end, we did it anyway and it was a good choice. We could see all of the biggest attractions in one day and met a couple of really nice people on the way. From our guide we heard a secret tip that you can actually hike up half of the way to Pão de Açucar (the Sugar Loaf) and get a free ride up to the actual mountain with the locals after 7pm. Because we love being stingy, we always take the chance to not pay for something. Two other people from our group decided to do it with us. According to our guide the hike was supposed to be easy and even her small son could walk it. It ended up being 30 minutes of natural 'stairs' made of tree roots and rocks. But we made it and the feeling was great! Then it turned out that her information was outdated and we couldn't get all the way up. It didn't matter though because the sunset and the view were just as great from the lower landing.

Jesus was touched by Anneli. Or the other
way around. Can you see the Holy Light
emitting from the touch? (Sanni does
not approve of this joke.)

The way up to Pão de Açúcar. Easy, right?

Desperation?

Sunset in Rio

After Rio we took a night bus to Curitiba. It was the best so far! We sat in the first row of a double-decker so we could lean our feet against the window and sleep properly. Sitting next to us there were two very nice grannies, one of them had just turned  100 years old. From Curitiba we were planning to travel to Ilha do Mel (the Honey Island). This time we were smart and found out in advance if there was a room for us. When we arrived to the beautiful island that has no cars and proper roads, just sand everywhere, we found out that our hostel keeper would find a room for us somewhere on the island, not in his hostel. Because he also rents tents, we decided to stay in one, paying only a half of what we would have paid for a room. A decision at least I grew to regret. The first night it was hot like hell and the second it rained and stormed like I had never experienced before. I was sure the tree covering the campsite would fall on us. Well it didn't and everything turned out just great. The island was absolutely beautiful and the water warm like 'birds milk' as the Finns say.

Ilha do Mel

Anneli trying to cool off in the breeze and also
 trying to take a cool pic. Sanni admitted of timing
the picture taking the way that only 1/8 pictures
does not have a bum showing. You are welcome world!

Now we are in Foz do Iguaçu trying to plan our next move. We just don't feel like leaving this hostel and its comfortable beds.  We have already been here for one night more than planned and seen the falls from the Brazilian and the Argentinian side. We know we don't have so much time to lose, but then again...comfortable beds (and good breakfast and nice atmosphere and people). We know we will go to Paraguay next, most likely to Encarnación to experience their twist on carnival.

Brazilian side with our new Irish friends

View from the Brazilian side of the falls

Unbelievably cute, fluffy and rabies-carrying mammal.
We thought it could be Marsupilami but apparently
it's some sort of raccoon or aardvark (maasika).

Devil's Throat, Garganta del Diablo - the first
and biggest of the falls.

We told you before that we are going to write about the feelings we have had about Brazilians and some of the cultural differences that have effected us the most. Now that we are leaving Brazil it feels like the best moment to tell you about them (not that we haven't been negative before. Heh. Heh.). After the first days in Salvador, we wrote a short text about our feelings. We didn't post it online, because we wanted to see if our feelings would stay the same after the initial shock. We do still feel shocked about the way people treat this unique and beautiful country they have, filling it with litter, cans and plastic bags. Seriously, they give one plastic bag for each item when you go grocery shopping.  To us it seems people don't see the effect of their actions. We have been laughing about how Brazilians must feel if they go to Finland and nobody packs their groceries, not to talk about the huge bags we have (bad customer service anyone?). The government tries to remind people not to litter by putting signs and billboards by the roads, but people learn to not care since childhood. I saw a 3-year-old eating a candy and just throwing the paper on the ground, just like the older lady next to him. Again, we have to say there are exeptions like D'Aventura, the firm we told you about. Brazilians are also very proud of their recycling system, something we haven't seen in action, but what hopefully works.

We took a shower under these waterfalls.
No one stayed dry on that boat ride.

In the text we also wondered about the attitude towards other people. We are not sure if we have just gotten used to it or do we just see things more positive, but people just don't seem so bad anymore. Somehow we have felt and still feel like many people would have a 'me first' -attitude to things. We don't know where this feeling comes from and also don't feel comfortable talking about it, because the subject is a nation that consists of groups with hugely different economical status. How people show caring and worry for the lesser, if they do it, is a riddle to us and in that sense also hard to understand for well-cared students from Finland. Respect towards other people and how it's shown is a very complicated concept and it defines a culture greatly. It's impossible for us to know if we can see respect in any other way than our own. We have talked with Brazilians about our feelings and some of them do agree with us, so maybe we are not totally off in our views.

View of the falls from the Argentinian side

After this labor-like try to get our feelings and my over-analytical head in order, we have to say that Brazil has been a joy and a puzzle. I'm sure it won't change in other South-American countries, but it has given us a good start to this trip that is turning into a load of deep hows and whys. In the last post Sanni was giving me compliments about being a good sport among all this portuguese, so now it's my turn. Poor Sanni has to listen to me analyze my head, her head and the head of every person that walks past. That's really not easy.

Oh and if you wonder about us not listing good and bad things about each other, we decided that it's none of your business. We still talk about all of them (mostly because I have to and make everyone else talk about everything), we just don't have the need to tell you about Sanni warming the water bottle with her hands and me screwing the cap unnecessarily tight. All you need to know is that we are having loads of fun, eating a lot of meat and inspite of our disagreements we still love eatch other (Sanni read it and made a throw-up-face).

We went to eat in a churrascaria, where
different types of delicious meats are
served to tables in swords. This picture
says more than a thousand words.

Chapter III - Homecoming

Arraial D'Ajuda - Porto Seguro - Belo Horizonte - Araxá - Uberaba - Araxá

Home is a curious place. You can spend long periods away from there and still, when you return, everything feels right. You are welcomed back and greeted with love by your family and friends, by the familiar smell of the house, by the walls and windowpanes.

My home away from home is this house in Araxá. I lived here the first six months of my exchange six years ago. This family taught me how to speak Portuguese and helped me to get along with a new culture. I can barely describe the feeling I have here: after these first, fairly difficult weeks of travelling this place, city and people offer me the brazilian way of life I grew to know back in the days. When we crossed the non-existing border between Bahia and Minas Gerais and drove between the green hills and mountains, I had the same feeling I get every time I visit my home town in Finland and I knew we had arrived home.

We were planning to stay here only for a few days and were sure that a four-day visit would be enough. Luckily we didn't do the same mistake as in Belo Horizonte (where we bought bus tickets in advance and came to regret it when we got to know how many cool places we could have gone to with our new friends from the hostel), and were able to extend our stay here. Even Anneli felt good energy in the house from the beginning so she didn't mind staying longer in one place.

We haven't done anything special (as Anneli put it), just met my friends and family, relaxed, gotten to know the city and practically lived a fairly normal life for a while. We've eaten tons of pão de queijo (from which Anneli has heard a lot), açai (equally as much talking) and drank a lot of juice made of fresh fruits. We even tried to surprise my host mum by making some ourselves using the surprisingly complex juicer, but she didn't appreciate it as much as we thought. Can't blame her, though, orange seeds don't taste too good.

It's been wonderful to be able to connect with people with whom I haven't kept in touch (shame on me). Meetings with the gang of my dearest friends have been delightful - I can't believe it was six years ago when we last trocamos idéias (exchanged thoughts). Meeting with families and relatives has been a lot of fun too, I'm surprised that they still recognise me! The hospitality and way of politeness here differs a lot from those we got to know in Bahia.

Anneli has been really brave, I must tell you. It's not uncommon that I forget to translate most of the conversations to her but thankfully a couple of my (and now hers too) friends do their best to help her understand.

Concerning another homecoming, we have something to tell you. After loads of thinking, discussing and compromising we have come to the conclusion that we'll shorten our trip. Our plan is to travel through all the countries we were going to, just in a shorter period of time. Flight back home is re-booked and we'll arrive in Finland on March 29th. That means we have still two and half months ahead of us and we'll enjoy them to the fullest.

We shall take a bus to Rio in a couple of hours and after spending a few days in the area, we'll head towards south. I don't think I'm speaking only for myself when I say that I can't wait to leave the beaches behind for a while and have adventures in places neither of us have visited.

We're sorry for the lack of pictures, once we have the chance we'll show you the best moments, including e.g. waterfalls, live music and food, of our stay here.

Chapter II - Sick in/of the paradise

Salvador - Itaparica - Valença - Morro de São Paulo - Itacaré - Arraial D'Ajuda

Do you know what's worse than being sick? Being sick when it's 30 degrees warm and you are supposed to keep travelling. Sanni has been a little bit sick for a while now (already before the trip) and has gotten worse all the time. Probably because of the shared waterbottles and the amount of kissing each other we do (hehe), I'm now sick as well. We both annoy people around us with the constant coughing and sneezing. Last night also had a bit of a fever (DENGUE!) That's thankfully gone now. Yesterday we went to the pharmacy and bought some strange-looking pills and pink coughing syrup, which hopefully helps soon. We think the air conditioning is making things worse. We are trying to avoid them as much as possible. We sleep in a dorm now so the nightly ac on/off battle is on. Last night we lost, but Sanni got to use her underwear designed for cold outdoor activities (lämpökerrasto) and her sleeping bag. I slep with socks and long pants aswell. We hate the ac! But hey, on the sunny side, at lieast for now the tourist diarrhea hasn't hit us.

Yummy!

We counted them the other day - 28 only in the legs!

In the negative theme of our resent posts, we have to say that we still aren't loving it here. Brazil is bigger than the whole Europe so the areas are really different too. We are now in the state Bahia, which is full of beaches and tourists. In Salvador a friend of our host was all the time saying what a paradise Bahia is and didn't want to hear anything contradicting to his views. His opinion was that if you don't like something here, you should leave. Somehow I do understand his view about changing your life instead of complaining about it, but it just felt like he just loved the place blindly. Which is weird because he is an economy professor and very aware of the situation in Brazil and also because he has travelled and seen other places. Then again every time someone looks at us with a condesending look, every time we pay more because we are tourists and every time we wait for an hour to get really bad service, we love Finland more and more. Even though there have been places where we have felt very welcome, we do look forward to going more south and to other countries. This paradise is just not quite how ours look like. You can argue that this is the cough speaking and we admit that partly it is, but one of the reasons why we left was the search for who we are and where we belong and so far our search has been pointing towards Europe and Finland.

Suco de goiaba, uma delicia!

First time trying açai.

The deep analysis aside you probably want to know what we've been doing the last days. We left Salvador early in the morning to catch a boat to Itaparica, a beautiful island near Salvador. On that island we felt the paradise for the first time. We were greeted by a friend of my sister whose brother has an adventure firm called D'Aventera on the island. We got to try stand boarding and cayacked while watching the sun set. He has a really admireable business ethic. They neutralize all of their CO-admissions and give jobs to local youngsters giving them a chance in life. All of this was very surprising after the behaviour we had seen in Salvador and which we will discuss in a later post.

The best food so far: ultimately good and cost only 12 euros each!

From Itaparica we headed to Morro de São Paulo, an island everybody was telling us to go to. The trip included a car, two vans, a bus and a boat, and also a lot of trusting in strangers. We had no place to sleep and practically no money, because all of the ATMs (seriously all of them) stopped working during the long weekend. In the end we got into a crappy hostel that was very expensive and had worms on the walls. During the night Sanni got 20 mosquito bites. Because the ATMs didn't work the next day either, we had no place to stay for the next night and because the island was packed with tourists we decided to leave. With 40 reais (13 €) in our pockets we managed to get to the nearest city Valença, found an ATM that worked and got to continue our trip. We heard that the ATM problem was in the whole area, so the 300 reais we managed to get didn't help us much. Our next destination was Itacare, a beautiful town that was also packed with tourists, but that gave us a good feeling from the start. We managed to find a hostel with helpful and welcoming staff. There we met 2 nice guys who were going to drive to our next destination the next day. With the warning "don't trust anyone" in our heads we decided to delight them with our company. Trusting them was a good choice because they let us sleep in their car for the hours before sunrise. They only wanted 35 reais for the drive that would have costed us 60 by bus. We had been smart and reserved a room for the next 3 nights already in advance so now we are here in our hostel in Arraial D'Ajuda. It's a bit rainy so our plans to look less like tourists through getting the perfect tan might not happen. Then again Sanni burned herself sleeping in the shade on a clowdy morning. This place has WiFi but just our luck the WiFi is down in the whole area. But hey! We finally got some cash when the ATMs started working after 5 days. Next up Minas Gerais.

Yay, tourist havaianas (and ipanemas)!

In case you have dificulties identifying the "I" in the posts, check the name on the bottom of the text. We take turns writing (the other one shouting over the shoulder).

Chapter I - Arrival

Jyväskylä - Helsinki - Amsterdam - Rio De Janeiro - Salvador

Unbelievable, we're actually here on the other side of the world! It's Wednesday evening and the year changed last night. We're laying on our luxurious bed in an apartment on the 16th floor of a marvellous building, enjoying the gentle breeze of warm night wind.

We arrived in Salvador on Sunday evening after 30 hours of travelling, with sweaty armpits and weary bodies. Anneli left her parents house on Saturday night around 10 and picked me up in Jyväskylä two hours later and so the trip towards Helsinki began. Luckily we didn't need to travel alone, but Aki, Joni and Johanna, three people very dear to us, took time to take us to the airport.

The flight to Amsterdam was a piece of cake, it was the twelve hour flight across the sea that was a surprise for us both - they had movies, music and language learning programmes, delicious food and eventually the flight didn't feel so long because the seats were comfortable and these travellers sleepy. Turbulence was disturbing, though. The first difficulties occurred in Brazil. First the federal police found it strange that they couldn't find my 6-year-old visa in my 2-year-old passport. Then we had to wait for our backpacks to get out of the plane, rush through the airport to another terminal and check them in again and try to pass the security control in time.  We made it quite in time and got to the plane to Salvador.

You'd think this was the end of the story, but I'll tell you something else: it wasn't. We didn't know the address of our host for the night and Salvador airport has no free WiFi. Anneli was able to get a free WiFi trial for 15 minutes (by selling her soul, as she claims), and after 14, 5 minutes of trying couchsurfing website started working and we found the address. Half an hour later we arrived in front of a hotel-like building.

We've spent the last few days getting accustomed to the heat, shopping for things we forgot and getting to know the city with help from our host, George. We spent the new year, reveillon, with him and his family. We followed the traditions, dressed in white as well as we could (I had a dress and Anneli was super white underneath her clothes), made wishes for the oncoming year and jumped seven waves. We were shocked by whacky brazilians around us on the beach who were shooting fireworks from their hands without any protection or anything! I'm just wondering how many eyes got lost that night.

The beginning of the trip has been somewhat difficult, especially for me. I've never been much of a homesickie, but this time the distance between me and Finland seems exceptionally long. The culture shock has been enormous, it seems that I need more peace and solitude in the darkness of winter and coming here right in the middle of winter is proving to be a tough task; brazilians especially here in the north are too loud and close for my liking at the moment. One (that meaning also us) must keep in mind that we've been here only for three days, though.

We decided ages ago that each blog entry would contain a like/dislike -section, where we'd write about each other with intention to remember to talk about our issues. I'm grateful beyond reason for Anneli's patience with me. I know I haven't been the best travelling buddy so far, but she has been understanding, given me space when I've needed it and talked with me when needed. Though the constant self-development and especially the need to develop others gets out of hand at times ;D Comment from Anneli: It's true that Sanni has been difficult. It's hard to see someone you love in a bad shape. It's also really hard to enjoy the trip when your travel companion really wants to be 9000km northeast from your dream. I have been mad about it. The good thing about Sanni is that I can tell her about my feelings and we can talk about it almost like adults (her listening quietly and me trying to change/improve her). Even better is that later she also tells me what she really thinks and not what I say she should. What I'm grateful for is that she can order food for me in her perfect Portuguese when I'm cranky.

Next time more sun, beach, fun and hopefully pictures too! Because a tablet and a camera aren't the best combination, we might not be able to provide you with as many pictures as we (and probably you too) would like to.

Happy New Year to all of our lovely friends and families ♥

Pictures: we on the plane, Anneli's thigh full of sun eczema (which can be seen all over her body and which appeared after only five minutes in the sun) and the view from our room in Salvador.